Forget What Is Behind You

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. – Philippians 3:12-14

Life is exactly like a race. From the time you are born until the time you die you are running a race. The one goal in every race is to cross the finish line. No matter what else you do in a race it doesn’t matter how hard you run or how fast you run. If you don’t cross the finish line you won’t win. One sure-fire way to get joy and ultimately win in the life you are living is to set God-given goals and then give your life every day to reaching those goals.

A man by the name of Paul gives us the formula on how to do that. He gives us three simple steps that you can use at the beginning of every year, every month, every week, and every day to make that year, that month, that week, and that day the best year, best month, best week and best day of your life. We’re going to talk about the first step today, and then we’ll discuss the other two over the next couple of days. 

The first step to running the race of life well is to forget what is behind you. Too many people never get to where they need to go today or tomorrow because they are still living in yesterday.

The truth is you can’t focus on where you are going until you forget where you’ve been. No runner has ever won a race by running the entire time looking backwards. Don’t misunderstand what that word “forget” means, though. It doesn’t mean to “fail to remember.” I mean there is no way you can ever totally erase the past from your memory. The word “forget” literally means “not to be influenced or affected by.”

If we really want to experience the kind of joy Paul talks about, if we want to win in the race of life, we must learn from the past, live in the present, and look to the future.

Dear Lord, I don’t want to live in the past anymore. I don’t want to be bound by what’s behind me. Instead, I want to be expectant of what you have in store for me in the future. I pray that you would give me hope as I charge ahead, and the courage to move on from my past. In Jesus’ name, amen.